The way I've seen him explain it before is that he believes that either anyone of senior management level and above is being payed way over the odds compared to the regular staff, or the regular staff are getting obscene salaries in comparison to other fields which utilise the same skillset. I don't know personally whether that's true or not, but that's the argument on the face of it.Break said:While you've quite accurately identified that the majority of a project's budget is spent on wages for people, to call it an "illusion" is, and I cannot stress this enough, a vast underestimation of how much it costs to pay a reasonably-sized dev team working on a modern game. Especially in recent years, where the time required to simply design and create a single room or character model has increased exponentially. The only reason we're able to see expansive, open-world games like Fallout 3 or FUEL is because of the growing use of procedurally-generated content, which allows large amounts of randomised, realistic-looking landscape to be created automatically. This means that manpower can be directed towards the individual and unique details which people actually pay attention to, rather than spending weeks hand-crafting forgettable expanses of land.Therumancer said:I also maintain that the cost of games is an illusion given that most of the money goes towards human resources to begin with. I'm not sure what kind of "resources" they are talking about here, unless they simply mean themselves, and the fact that nobody wants to be the guy stuck in doing a very involved "secret area" that maybe 3% of the player base is going to see, sort of like the fat kid being stuck "way out deep" in a baseball game.
To be honest, I'm not quite sure how to go about making you realise what kind of misconception you've made, simply because it's so damn big. I don't suppose it'd be as easy as telling you "that's not how it works, just because it's mostly Human Resources doesn't make it cheap"?
Deus Ex 3 Team Didn't Get it at First, Says Director
- Thread starter Logan Westbrook
- Start date
...Good start. It's strange that in the era of "sandbox" games so many games limit player choice to things that have no effect on plot like choosing vehicles and routes or collecting secret hidden gewgaws.
I think if I were in charge I would suggest to my team that the upside of being responsible for options the player might not choose would be the opportunity to make content that was itself a little more "off the beaten path": encourage them to find unusual uses for abilities the player might not have considered, create minor, one-scene characters who add dimension to their settings, let the player see things that give them a deeper sense of what's happening "behind the scenes" with particular factions, and so on.
I think if I were in charge I would suggest to my team that the upside of being responsible for options the player might not choose would be the opportunity to make content that was itself a little more "off the beaten path": encourage them to find unusual uses for abilities the player might not have considered, create minor, one-scene characters who add dimension to their settings, let the player see things that give them a deeper sense of what's happening "behind the scenes" with particular factions, and so on.
There
Allowing for player agency will *always* cost time first, some energy second and perhaps also money if it involves complex cinematics or voice acting. To say that including player agency is not that big of a strain on monetary cost can even be correct in some cases.
But in terms of energy and time costs? Dude...I assure you, player agency costs a ton. Really, it's better explained in "But thou must", so I might as well link it to you. It's somewhere in the middle I think, explained very well with Alpha Protocol development being set as the example.
http://www.blip.tv/file/3491456
I'd say there are different costs involved. There's the cost of money and then there's the cost of energy and the most critical one can be the cost of time.Therumancer said:Hmmm, well I think it's not just that it's a "waste of resources" as they put it, but also because designers want people to see their work like artists do. Creating something that only a tiny handfull of players are going to see... like some high end raid zones in MMORPGS used to be, makes them feel like they are wasting their time. Not to mention the fact that if the work is not well known and is hard for anyone to verify it makes it difficult to put on a resume later.Loonerinoes said:
I also maintain that the cost of games is an illusion given that most of the money goes towards human resources to begin with. I'm not sure what kind of "resources" they are talking about here, unless they simply mean themselves, and the fact that nobody wants to be the guy stuck in doing a very involved "secret area" that maybe 3% of the player base is going to see, sort of like the fat kid being stuck "way out deep" in a baseball game.
In absolute terms to develop a game you need office space, computers, and code monkeys to bang on those computers (graphics design, line coding, etc... voice actors and such are not code monkeys but are in the same catagory as human resources). If you've got say a hundred million dollars, the office space and computers might count for a few million but the rest goes towards the people.
Simply looking at it this way is what fuels a lot of my discussions on the subject (which occasionally get John Funk involved), the secrecy of the industry when it comes to their use of money also doesn't help. In a lot of respects when I see complaints about game developers and the costs a lot of it seems to me like people basically saying "well, one of the big problems is that I demand so much money that finding people to keep paying me is rough".
Allowing for player agency will *always* cost time first, some energy second and perhaps also money if it involves complex cinematics or voice acting. To say that including player agency is not that big of a strain on monetary cost can even be correct in some cases.
But in terms of energy and time costs? Dude...I assure you, player agency costs a ton. Really, it's better explained in "But thou must", so I might as well link it to you. It's somewhere in the middle I think, explained very well with Alpha Protocol development being set as the example.
http://www.blip.tv/file/3491456
Too bad they're ruining it with bloom, regen health and a cover system. Ah well, that's consoles for you.
when i saw Let's Plays, and Walkthrough on youtube of Deus Ex, i discovered stuff that otherwise i wouldn't have known to exist, so as for me, this game will be
"Game of the Decade" !
"Game of the Decade" !
And here we have a textbook example of someone who doesn't get it.sneakypenguin said:
I don't play games just to see the content. I play them for the experience and the fun. Having choices that actually make a significant difference to how the game progresses makes this game so much more interesting, and gives it replay value by varying the experience depending on what you do.
Ideally, you won't have to play through it again. You'll want to.
I've never played Deus Ex (I missed having a pc to play it by about 9 years) so I'm definitely interested in how this is shaping up. Everything I've heard has been good, and worst case scenario, at least we know the cutscenes will be awesome by the gobsmacking trailer.
Deus Ex cost much less money than it would cost to make the exact same game today. That is really the issue... imagine you spend two or three days working on a character model and then realize that players could bypass it completely.Eagle Est1986 said:
Still, good for them...Deus Ex is one of my favorite games, and I am not an FPS person at all.
This post actually has my hopes up a bit since I'm really tired of my games treating me like I'm new to the whole gaming thing, on the 4th playthrough no less.
These tutorials are useless in most games, that's what the MANUAL is for, did they forget that? If you don't know what jump is and theres no control lay out, pull out that analog instruction device and READ.
These tutorials are useless in most games, that's what the MANUAL is for, did they forget that? If you don't know what jump is and theres no control lay out, pull out that analog instruction device and READ.
Break said:While you've quite accurately identified that the majority of a project's budget is spent on wages for people, to call it an "illusion" is, and I cannot stress this enough, a vast underestimation of how much it costs to pay a reasonably-sized dev team working on a modern game. Especially in recent years, where the time required to simply design and create a single room or character model has increased exponentially. The only reason we're able to see expansive, open-world games like Fallout 3 or FUEL is because of the growing use of procedurally-generated content, which allows large amounts of randomised, realistic-looking landscape to be created automatically. This means that manpower can be directed towards the individual and unique details which people actually pay attention to, rather than spending weeks hand-crafting forgettable expanses of land.Therumancer said:I also maintain that the cost of games is an illusion given that most of the money goes towards human resources to begin with. I'm not sure what kind of "resources" they are talking about here, unless they simply mean themselves, and the fact that nobody wants to be the guy stuck in doing a very involved "secret area" that maybe 3% of the player base is going to see, sort of like the fat kid being stuck "way out deep" in a baseball game.
To be honest, I'm not quite sure how to go about making you realise what kind of misconception you've made, simply because it's so damn big. I don't suppose it'd be as easy as telling you "that's not how it works, just because it's mostly Human Resources doesn't make it cheap"?
Someone else explained my point of view fairly well. I've been down this road before.
The bottom line is that irregardless of the technology being used someone sits down to bang out the lines of code or draw the pictures on the computer. It comes down to how much those code monkeys are demanding for their services in proportion to yesteryear. While you ARE dealing with people with college degrees and such, college degrees aren't what they used to be, and mean very little other than to prevent doors from being closed.
When you get to the bottom line, when you take a couple million off for hardware and office space and then divide up the human resources budget your looking at situations where these coders are liable to be getting paid hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars for a couple of years work. The industry basically having seen massively increased demands from the employees, the budgets involved here aren't going into space and hardware. Even making John Funk's arguement about college degrees in computers or whatever, you run into a situation where there are guys with degrees who don't come close to making this much, including some that should. A guy with 2-4 years in criminal Justice who works as a cop or high end security professional and risks potentially being shot at every day doesn't make what these guys do.
Now, on the surface coders and other people do not claim to make that much money. There are many people who have said on these forums alone "I know people in the industry, and they don't make that much money" however at the same time we've also seen links to articles like one from Maxim talking about "why game programmers drive ferraris" (and I think that understated the issue). The bottom line is that the industry keeps it's finances secret, and this is why if you do some searching you'll find that most analysts don't even know how much the industry is making. When I last did a search for links, I found experts claiming anywhere from 19 to 50 billion dollars in profit the huge variation being due to the fact that the books are closed even compared to other businesses. Furthermore while everyone is predicting massive growth, nobody can tell if the industry is going to 'double' in 2 years or 10 again because those numbers are carefully sat on.
In the end, if you see a game with like a 100 million dollar budget, chances are like 90 million of that went towards paying wages and salaries over a couple of years. That's utterly insane. "Modern Warfare 2" took half a billion dollars to develop and market, there are entire nations that don't make that much money. While "Modern Warfare 2" is an okay game I guess, stop and think about what you could buy for half a billion dollars.
Don't get me wrong here though, I'm a capitolist. The gaming industry is out there to make money. On the other hand I as a consumer am going to look at how much people are making when someone tells me I need to pay $60 for a video game, and that the price should be higher, because of these massive budgets. I look at the amounts of money developers "require" from producers, along with the secrecy, and then pretty much come to the conclusion that the situation is fundementally ridiculous. While that's my usual point here, it does contribute to other discussions as well, like the one we're having.
In the end I'm not saying human resources are cheap, quite the contrary. I think the bottom line is the fact that your getting code monkeys who claim they are just making a living, while probably keeping a Lamborgini stashed in the garage of their second house or whatever. When you think about the numbers it puts an entirely differant spin on things.
Heck, look at the whole Infinity Ward thing. A lot of the issues involve come down to hundreds of millions of dollars in promised bonuses. I tend to agree that when money is promised by an employer they should deliver it, however on the other hand even allowing for the fact that it's split between everyone at the IW office, it is fundementally ridiculous that coders and game developers are expecting hundreds of millions of dollars for what amounts to drawing pictures and banging out lines of code.
See, I don't believe that game developers should be stuck working out of their basements for peanuts like int he old days, but at the same time I don't think we should be seeing these millions upon millions of dollars flowing into their payroll either (which inflates our costs as the end user). I believe there is a middle ground. Truthfully if the situation was as someone like John Funk believes it is, that wouldn't be terrible (and the problems must like elsewhere) but I don't think that's the case because in the end it all comes down to where all this money is going to, and whose pockets it winds up in. For all the people decrying how game developers don't make that much money, we see explosions like the one at Infinity Ward demonstrating exactly how much money is floating around these empolyees. This isn't even getting into the senior managers/faces like Itigaki or Peter Molyneux, Itigaki being in a fight with Team Ninja at one point over like twenty million dollars he claims he was owed.... and he does what exactly to earn 20 million? Remember in the end we the consumers are the ones who pay for this, it's the true face of those "Development costs" that keep our games expensive.
At any rate, while long, I hope this is clearer.
Loonerinoes said:ThereI'd say there are different costs involved. There's the cost of money and then there's the cost of energy and the most critical one can be the cost of time.Therumancer said:Hmmm, well I think it's not just that it's a "waste of resources" as they put it, but also because designers want people to see their work like artists do. Creating something that only a tiny handfull of players are going to see... like some high end raid zones in MMORPGS used to be, makes them feel like they are wasting their time. Not to mention the fact that if the work is not well known and is hard for anyone to verify it makes it difficult to put on a resume later.Loonerinoes said:
I also maintain that the cost of games is an illusion given that most of the money goes towards human resources to begin with. I'm not sure what kind of "resources" they are talking about here, unless they simply mean themselves, and the fact that nobody wants to be the guy stuck in doing a very involved "secret area" that maybe 3% of the player base is going to see, sort of like the fat kid being stuck "way out deep" in a baseball game.
In absolute terms to develop a game you need office space, computers, and code monkeys to bang on those computers (graphics design, line coding, etc... voice actors and such are not code monkeys but are in the same catagory as human resources). If you've got say a hundred million dollars, the office space and computers might count for a few million but the rest goes towards the people.
Simply looking at it this way is what fuels a lot of my discussions on the subject (which occasionally get John Funk involved), the secrecy of the industry when it comes to their use of money also doesn't help. In a lot of respects when I see complaints about game developers and the costs a lot of it seems to me like people basically saying "well, one of the big problems is that I demand so much money that finding people to keep paying me is rough".
Allowing for player agency will *always* cost time first, some energy second and perhaps also money if it involves complex cinematics or voice acting. To say that including player agency is not that big of a strain on monetary cost can even be correct in some cases.
But in terms of energy and time costs? Dude...I assure you, player agency costs a ton. Really, it's better explained in "But thou must", so I might as well link it to you. It's somewhere in the middle I think, explained very well with Alpha Protocol development being set as the example.
http://www.blip.tv/file/3491456
I went into things at length in an earlier message, so this is likely to be a short version. You can easily read a longer rant in my other post.
In the end it comes down to the fact that a game takes a couple of years for a design team to bang out usually, sometimes less.
When it comes to resources the big issue is more or less how much the developers demand for their services. It's like this, a developer tells a producer that it's going to need say a hundred million dollars to make a game over a two year period. They spend a couple million on new hardware, a couple million to pay off their office space and utilities, and then all the rest of that money goes to the human resources. Now how specifically it gets divided up is unknown but your basically looking at funding were depending on the game you could have guys banging out lines of code getting paid ridiculous salaries for what is involved, like a quarter of a million dollars a year or more.
I'm not someone who is saying that game developers should be living hand to mouth, but as a consumer there is a point where I look at this, since the expense is passed on to me, and simply say "that's ridiculous".
One of the big problems with the industry is that they keep their finances more or less secret. The analysts have no clear idea how much the gaming industry is making because of this. Ditto for the exact rate of growth. The last time I bothered to hunt down links the earnings for last year for the gaming industry as a whole were somewhere between 19 to 50 billion dollars, which is a huge amount of variance, which sort of demonstrates exactly how much fog there is over this thing (and doubtlessly for good reason).
A lot of people like to point fingers at voice actors and the like as the culprits for rising prices. I am however something of an Anime fan (I used to be bigger, but still watch it) and have seen a lot of stuff about people who do professional voice acting for animation and video games, and it's apparently hard to make a full time living at. These guys do not get paid massive amounts of money for their work for the most part. In the end the expense is again the code monkey running the machines.
The issue with "agency" comes down to the other points discussed, but also to the bottom line that coders are expecting ridiculous amounts of money, and that is what influances things. It's not so much that someone gets paid for everything, but the ridiculous amounts of money developers want to charge for what they are doing.
This is already longer than expected, but to again make a point I used in my previous message. Look at the whole "Infinity Ward" thing. Not only did Modern Warfare 2 cost half a billion dollars to develop and market (and think about what you could buy for half a billion dollars, and what they actually produced), but a big part of the battle revolves around hundreds of millions of dollars of bonuses promised to the workers. While I do believe that an employer should pay promised bonuses, I think hundreds of millions of dollars for an office full of game developers/code monkeys is ridiculous to the point of being obscene.
I've become very critical of the industry in recent years, as I honestly think greed is doing a job on gaming. The issue isn't so much the difficulty of producing these big game projects, it's how much people are trying to gouge in developing them. It isn't about people wanting to make a living doing something they love anymore, it seems to increasingly be about people wanting to get rich, for doing minimal effort, connected to something they love (but don't love so much that they aren't willing to let it die in pursuit of the allmighty dollar).
Whether anyone believes it or not, I've done quite a bit of reading on this subject over the years, and a lot of thinking on it as well. There are only so many times I was able to hear "Games are so expensive because of these budgets which are equal to Hollywood blockbusters!" before I started looking into it, noticing the lack of general information, and doing some figuring based on what things were being said.
Unrelated to the point as a whole, but it should clarify what I was saying.
